Ghosts
by mholub00
Summary: He just wants her to trust him. (One-shot)


A hand reaches out from the darkness, grabbing his ankle. He jumps from the touch of the frozen skin, a shiver running down his back. He knows pulling away is no use, it never is. Long and boney fingers wrap around his wrist and the chill spreads. The hissing starts and he stands still, trying in vain to keep his heart rate down. Over the years he's learned that they're seemingly strengthened by fear. Two more hands emerge into his limited range of sight and the grips of all four tighten, beginning the slow pull in opposite directions.

"Clint Barton," the voice says, seeming to be everywhere at once. It's low and scratchy and the volume of the hissing increases. Always the same. "Clint Barton, why do you kid us?"

The burning feeling starts in his wrists.

"You are nothing more than a murderer playing hero."

He clamps his jaw shut as the force of the pulling increases ever so slightly, anticipating the white hot pain that flashes through his body.

There's a crash and on the other side of the darkness, someone screams.

Clint bolts upright in bed, his breathing heavy. It had been real again, almost real and he rubs the spot on his wrist where the blinding pain had been only moments before. The calming patter of the rain against the window slowly drowns out the echoing sounds of the scream and he falls back on the pillows, running his hands across his face. It was almost real, but it wasn't, he reminds himself. Just a dream.

Slowly, he sits up again, remembering what had woken him in the first place. The last part wasn't a dream- no one ever screamed, nothing ever shattered. That had been very real. Clint throws back the tangled sheets, sliding from the bed. From the floor he grabs a pair of discarded sweatpants, slipping them on. The gun is heavy is the pocket and he pulls it out, smiling a little and feeling almost as paranoid as Natasha.

He tells himself it's nothing, there's nothing wrong. But no one ever screams.

The hallway is dark and the door creaks on rusty hinges. Clint slows his breathing to match his quiet tread, heading carefully in the direction of the main room. An orange-ish glow is cast by a single light bulb and it flickers as he steps closer. There's a thud and someone groans. He flicks off the safety.

Breathing. It is quiet but he hears it none the less and he points the gun in its direction, the hairs on the back on his neck standing up. He can barely make out a figure on the floor. The weak light reflects off something he assumes to be glass, and Clint reaches for the switch on the wall behind him, keeping his eyes on the figure and the gun aimed in its direction, just in case.

Yellow light floods the room and he has to blink to focus. He sighs out of relief when he sees the red curls huddled on the floor as opposed to some robber, flipping back on the safety and replacing the gun in his pocket.

"Watch your step."

He tenses at the slight waver in her voice. "Natasha?"

She motions to the glass strewn around her and he follows her hand. Several larger shards have identifiable black lines across them and he groans. Of course, breaking just a cup wouldn't be enough. She had to break the coffee pot.

Natasha moves slightly and stiffly and Clint watches the way her curls cascade off her shoulder. Her foot shifts and his eyes are drawn to the movement, and what it reveals. The pool of blood forming on the tile is the same shade of red as her hair. He watches it drip slowly from the streaks down her arm.

He takes a carful step forward. "Natasha." She looks up at him for a second before turning away.

"It was an accident."

"Let me see it," he says quietly.

She pulls her arm closer to her body, refusing to look in his direction. "I didn't mean to."

"Please."

"I'm fine."

"No you're not."

As if to prove it, she stands. "I'm fine."

She sways and his hand goes to her shoulder to steady her. She closes her eyes and leans against the wall. He can now see clearly the cuts crisscrossing her hand. "When was the last time you slept?" he asks.

"I'm fine," she repeats, turning away from him once more.

Clint runs a hand down his face with a tired sigh. "At least let me wrap up your hand, then." She looks at him for a second before nodding only once. He can't help but smile a little- it's not much, but it's progress.

Natasha lets his hand stay on her arm because honestly it's keeping her from collapsing, and it's even a little nice, and he leads her into the small apartment bathroom. She sits on the counter, holding her injured arm over the sink and watching the blood continue to drip and slip smoothly down the drain. Clint pulls a new first aid kit from the closet, SHIELD issued, unwrapping a new pair of tweezers and gauze and beginning the process of removing all the glass from her hand.

"Do…you want to talk about it?" he asks after a minute of silence, looking up at her expressionless face for only a moment.

"About what?" She watches him dig a small shard from her skin.

"About whatever dream—"

"Nightmare."

"Okay. Whatever nightmare you had? Or why you haven't slept?"

"No."

Clint can feel her gaze shift between her hand and his face and he furrows his eyebrows. He's not sure about what he's about to do, but he can trust her, right? Even if she doesn't trust him? He takes a deep breath. "I don't understand why it scares me so much."

When she doesn't respond, he continues.

"They don't do much, you know? It's just hands. And they're really cold, until the pain comes. It hurts like hell, but the pain I can deal with. But it's his voice- my brother's voice. When we were kids he was the one who stood up for me, protected me. He's part of the reason I became Hawkeye. And I…" he pauses, trailing off. He's not sure he wants to tell her that part, not yet.

"Now I hear his voice in my dreams. The same thing, every time. He says I'm not a hero. And that's true, I'm not. Never have been. Then he calls me a murderer, and that gets me. Because I tell myself it's not true, that what I do is helping people, right? But in the end, it is. It is true. And it's slightly terrifying."

The clean water mixes with blood as he washes out the sink, pointedly not looking at her. He can feel her eyes on his face, almost as if they were burning his skin.

He waits for her to say something, hoping she may open up for once and at least act like she trusts him.

The silence continues. He sighs and begins bandaging her hand in an effort to mask his disappointment. When he finishes, he steps back from the counter to give her as much space as the small bathroom will allow.

She doesn't move, staring at the white bandages wrapped around her porcelain skin as if she can't quite remember why they're there. Natasha blinks once, twice. "We have a code."

Clint looks up from the floor.

"We have a code," she repeats. "But the truth is that we lie and kill for people who are no better than we are. There's no way to make up for the horrors, for everything we've done. So we just ignore it and move on, don't we? But it comes back, it always comes back."

She looks at him now and he can see the crack in her mask. "The first time I asked 'why' was when I was fifteen. I just woke up one morning and everything I'd thought for so many years was right suddenly seemed so wrong. Morals aren't something they teach along with the skills to be an assassin. Now I'm stuck with ghosts, and they come in the dark and whisper things. People I could have saved- should have saved."

Natasha slides from the counter, landing on the tile with a barely audible thud. To his surprise, she still doesn't leave but looks at the floor, crossing her arms as if to protect herself from something. "I killed children, Clint."

Despite the circumstances, a small smile crosses his face. She never uses his first name.

Clint takes a step towards her, and against his better judgment he puts a hand on her shoulder. She tenses at his touch but, thankfully, doesn't attack him like he expected.

"You're going to be okay, you know. I promise."

For a while, neither of them moves and silence falls between them. Natasha is aware of how nice and…_comforting _his hand feels. He feels her tense up again.

It takes only a second for the look in her eyes to change and her walls go flying back up. She steps away from him, taking the moment with her.

"Goodnight Barton," she says, her voice having returned to the stiff formality he's grown so used to.

She slips around him and out of the bathroom. He stays still for a second, straining to hear anything as she retreats back to her room. He smiles slightly- as usual, her footsteps are undetectable.

"Goodnight, Natasha," he says to an empty room. He'd been close, so close, to that genuine trust he wanted.

With a sigh, a yawn, and a groan, he begins cleaning the bathroom.


End file.
